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Hi everyone. I was with SSE at my old address, moved into my partner's March 2022 and we moved to a bigger house together in August 2022.

New Tenants moved straight into my old house August 2022, I gave final meter readings over the phone as I've always done when I moved and thought nothing else of it.

Then in February 2024 around (18) months after I moved out, OVO said I owed £1800 July 2022- March 2023, I sent them loads of evidence to show I wasn't living there at that time by showing full tenancy agreement at new address, estate agents confirming I was, driving licence at new address, Council tax letter, HMRC and doctors letters at new address, also Octopus confirming I was with them at that time at new address and proving someone else was living their at that time, yet OVO said none of this is proof and continued with debt collection LCS and Solicitor, my question is, is it normal that OVO do not accept any of the above as proof of address?

@Nukecad Thank you. I completely misunderstood the whole process and haven't explained we'll at all in here and Apollogies for this. I'll put in order of what's happened. The CCJ was entered as I lost by default, so I applied using the n244 form to ask for the order to be set aside, I waited around 4 weeks for a response, but didn't hear back so call the national business centre who made the order, but was told I would have to apply the n244 form again to my local court as a Writ of control had been issued and had to ask for a stay and set aside, I went to court yesterday, OVO didn't show up, the judge said immediately that he was setting the order aside, and he mentioned my evidence is favourable, but I far as I understand from what the judge said, it isn't cancelled but reset to the beginning of the claim, my understanding now is I have to show my defence to OVO and the original court to see if I can have the order cancelled.


That is progress, but you are now at a critical stage. We strongly recommend you seek legal advice at this point - you’ll need it if you want to get the best possible chance of sorting this out.


@Steve107 no great problem, it was just getting confusing from what you were saying at first.

So the original CCJ has now been Set aside, that’s a good start.
(“Stayed” means that any and all enforcement action of the original CCJ has been stopped, so if you do get a letter asking you to pay it you just tell them that it has been set aside).

That doesn’t mean that the whole matter is cancelled though.

Your understanding is correct and the case now has to be reheard from the start - but this time you will get a chance to mount a defence.

See: https://nationaldebtline.org/get-information/guides/setting-aside-a-ccj-ew/

If the judgment is set aside by the court, this means that the proceedings go back to the claim stage and any enforcement action is also cancelled. You have a new opportunity to fill in the reply to the claim form, make an offer of payment or put in any defence or counterclaim.

Having a judgment set aside does not wipe out the proceedings altogether, but the details will be removed from the Register of Judgments, Orders and Fines until a new judgment is made.

Whilst the judge who granted the set aside did say that your evidence looks favourable to him/her it is not likely to be him/her who rehears your case, so you can only take what he said as an informed opinion.

As with anything involving a court hearing it is wise to get proper legal advice about how best to present your defence to the court.

Good luck for the new hearing.


@Nukecad Great advice thanks, I've confused myself too 🙃 I will seek at least legal advice in the future.


I’m so sorry to hear this ​@Steve107. It sounds like a very stressful situation. This isn’t my area of expertise & has gone further than customer support. 

I really hope this gets resolved for you. It sounds like you have sufficient evidence to show you don’t owe this money. 

Please keep us posted with how you get on. 


@Emmanuelle_OVO 

Thank you. I did receive a call from OVO 0330 102 7400 (complaints) saying they have the evidence and will be looking into resolving this, the call was a few weeks ago, but not had any updates as yet.


Hi ​@Steve107

 

I’m happy to hear that someone is looking into this for you. The Complaints team would usually reach out as soon as they have an update for you.

 

If you do need to chase this up, it may be worth calling the team back. They should be able to pass you to your complaint handler who should be able to give you an update.

 

Please let us know how you get on. 


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